Patina Osaka

'It’s kids’ hour until 6pm, so you might prefer to come after that if you want a more… relaxing swim,' Patina’s (very stylish, really rather hunky) spa guy tells me. I confess that I’m travelling with a 22-month-old and therefore relaxing at any time in any setting is a fond but frankly laughable memory at this point. I stare wistfully at the millpond-still 30°C pool and bubbling Jacuzzi beyond — surrounded by giant day-beds and chilled grapefruit water — while making a determined mental note to deposit Mini Smith with Mr Smith later.

Patina stubbornly refuses to accept Osaka's reputation as a built-up city. At every opportunity, including from the spa, it capitalises instead on the spectacularly green view over Osaka Castle. And rightly so: it’s an absolute stunner. After checking in with some deliciously cold yuzu tea, we scan our fob on the hotel room door and lo, the blinds automatically ascend to reveal the 262-acre park, replete with cherry blossom and plum trees, the five-tiered castle perched in its centre like a wedding cake. The rooms have giant windows with a raised tatami platform, designed exclusively for lying down and staring at the wild spectacle of it. Visit in April and you’ll see a carpet of blossom; in the autumn, it’s aflame with red and orange leaves. (Side note on other delightful automation: whenever I approach the bathroom, the Toto loo opens its lid with a jolly beep, flushes when I stand up, and closes its own lid. Nothing says luxury to me like never having to touch a toilet seat.)

Osaka Castle was originally built in the 1500s but has faced a torrid string of sieges, fires and rebuilds since. The main tower standing now was built in the 1930s, its multi-layered copper roofs having acquired a gorgeous oxidised green — a patina, if you will. This carries subtly through into design elements inside the hotel. The minibar, for example, is a beautifully well-built series of lacquered sage doors, the cutlery within all made of copper. Other homages are wherever you look for them, from a giant artwork in the bar that uses soil and stone from the grounds as materials, to the gold tiger statues in every room, mirroring the two golden tigers carved into the castle’s penultimate storey. 

If any of this sounds fusty or trite, it doesn’t feel it. The hotel has only been open for a year and its freshness is palpable. Spaces are large, light and airy. Wood, stone and greenery are everywhere. It’s modern and cool without having overthought itself, a little patch of peace in an otherwise hectic city. In fact, one room on the 20th floor is open from 6.30am for guests to take in the sun rising in the east, provided they leave their phones at the door. 

The emphasis on relaxation at Patina is extremely pleasing to me. It's a different flavour of luxury to some of the more formal hotels elsewhere in Japan — here, the staff are attentive, chatty and seem genuinely pleased to be there. Beyond the spa's pool and Jacuzzi, the men's section has a dry sauna and the women's has a steam room, along with endless Bamford products, vanity stations furnished with Dysons and pretty much anything you might have forgotten to bring with you. Its dark wood and sandstone are beautifully grounding — even if it had been busy, it would have still felt spacious.

The place has a dreamy, sepia quality, kind of like if the Sixties had power showers, USB-C ports and wellness trends. The bar, Sonata, really is like a time capsule. One cocktail, the New Trunk Line is named after the literal translation of Shinkansen — also known as the bullet train — to signify the impact of that connection to Tokyo and other parts of the country when it opened in 1964. And in homage to the city’s powerful transformation over the Sixties, Seventies and Eighties, vinyl in the bar is carefully selected to reflect the best of the era.

It’s this connection to the city that sets Patina apart. In any number of upscale hotels around the world, you could be anywhere. But meticulous thought has gone into every element of this place; it is respectful of Osaka’s history, but more than that it seeks to be a part of it — using local food suppliers, working with the city’s music talent. There’s a gold mural that spans an entire wall of the hotel’s teppanyaki restaurant Barin, which pulls out defining moments from Osaka’s past in gorgeous illustrated detail. This hotel simply couldn’t exist anywhere else.

Also — extremely importantly — the breakfast is excellent. There’s an extensive à la carte menu, including your usual eggs any which way, but also dim sum, ramen and brioche French toast so pillowy and divine we had to test it three times. The self-service option is vast — every kind of bake, fruit and cereal, but also stir-fries and elaborate cheese boards. It’s served in Iñaki, which at all other times is a Basque-inspired grill and rotisserie, a chilled spot where kids are always welcome. 

The tea lounge Nijiri was in the middle of a collaboration with the French jeweller Chaumet when we visited, so we felt it’d be rude not to sample its special menu, themed around the brand’s bumblebee collection. Cue predictable amounts of honey, but more surprisingly the most exquisite itsy-bitsy teenie-weenie ham and cheese panini. Plus an embarrassment of tea options, all bottomless for the duration of your visit. It’s an elevated and restrained space, letting the white and blue washi on the thick spiral staircase take centre-stage. But it’s not stuffy. Case in point: it’s clearly fine for me to sit there in short shorts while my toddler swings his Crocs — dusty from a romp in the Castle park — in his high-end high chair.

I did, eventually, get that serene swim — Jacuzzi bubbling, castle glowing, not a single small person in sight. Patina somehow pulls off feeling like a sexy retreat and a family-friendly hotel at once, which is either very clever design or very good staff, possibly both. Either way: bring the kids if you have them, then send them to bed early.